Executive Summary 















Information Technology (IT) 
touches almost every activity at every University System of Maryland (USM)
institution.  Recognizing this, Senate Bill (SB) 682 calls upon the 
Board 
of Regents (BOR) to create and maintain an IT strategic plan.  This plan, 
by necessity, must be inclusive of the IT plans that each USM institution 
needs to chart its own direction in IT, but it must also address those issues 
that either transcend individual institutions or chart potential collaborative directions
among the institutions. This plan is intended to be a roadmap for the leadership
of the USM in these areas.



 


Given the dynamic nature of the field and the range of activities that 
must be included, the USM IT Strategic Plan is presented as an interactive,
online document.  This document is intended to be approached in a nonlinear
manner.  One reads it by focusing on the area of interest rather than by 
starting at an identified beginning and reading until an identified end.
It will be maintained at the USM together with hyperlinks to the current 
USM Strategic Plan, 
institutional plans and other subsidary documents.



This plan starts by articulating an overarching vision, which is shaped 
by the priorities established by the BOR, for how information technology 
can support the missions of each USM institution. The next introductory 
section of this plan describes the issues that the USM institutions must 
address in order to achieve this vision, together with some brief analysis 
of current status in key issue areas.

 
Finally, while this is a Strategic Plan with a time horizon of up to 5 
years, there are issues that require much more immediate resolution. 
Prime among these is that of assuring access by all students to 
electronic services. The next section of the introduction lays out an 
approach for dealing with this issue by the beginning of the 2002 
academic year.






  
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  
  
  
  
  



 


At the core of the USM IT Strategic Plan are the plans of the 13 USM 
institutions. As individual institutions have articulated differing 
missions, their use of IT in achieving those missions will also be 
somewhat different. The institutional IT plans are informed by the current 
priorities established by the USM BOR.  The current priorities are 
articulated in the IT Minimum Standard BOR Resolution.  



There are four System-level activities built around this core.  





    

  1. A significant value of the USM as a System is the ability to 
collaborate.  There are more collaborative opportunities than there are 
resources to take advantage of them.  Thus, this plan lays out opportunities
and prioritizes them.  The current top priority collaborative activities are:
    

      
 Site Licensing and Volume Purchasing
      
 Customer Services Systems
      
 Electronic Services Architecture
      
 IT Human Resources - Recruitment, Retention, and Training
      

    

    

  2. SB 682 has some very specific articles regarding issues that must be 
addressed in this plan.  These issues focus on the interface between USM 
Information Technology systems, services, policies, and procedures and 
those of the State as articulated in law and in the State IT Master Plan 
(ITMP). This plan describes the approaches that the USM will use to create
 and maintain a seamless interface between USM and the state, while meeting
 the different needs of our higher education institutions.
    


    

  3. There are common services that all USM institutions have come to 
depend upon intercampus networking and videoconferencing, articulation 
services, and a common Online Public Access Catalog.  The status and future
plans for these common services underlie many other activities in the USM.
    


    

  4. Finally, the USM necessarily has interfaces to many other communities: 
business, state agencies, various educational entities, and others.  The 
ability for the USM to succeed in achieving its goals and aspirations in 
many cases will depend on such relationships.  Since the USM aspires to 
provide educational leadership in the State, and since IT is especially rich 
in such opportunities, the USM will need to plan, build, and maintain the 
interactions with these external communities.
    


    

    

    [ Main Page | Introduction | Strategic Challenges
    | Minimum IT Standard | Institutions | Issues and Actions
    ] 
    
    [ Environmental/Competitive Context | Interface with the State 
    | Partnerships | USM IT Initiatives] 
    
Last Updated on October 01, 2001


    
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